Roti Fixed Zoning, His Lawyer Concedes

Defense Challenges Other Charges

January 13, 1993|By Matt O'Connor.

A defense lawyer admitted Tuesday that former Ald. Fred Roti fixed a zoning change in 1989, but he contended the government has not corroborated a longtime corrupt lawyer's claim that Roti helped fix a Chinatown murder trial in 1981.

But federal prosecutor Thomas Durkin, in closing arguments at Roti's bribery trial, maintained the government proved that "you can get away with murder in Chicago if you had a fix in the 1st Ward and money to pay for it."

As the four-week trial neared a conclusion, the focus shifted to the most serious charge facing Roti, the fix of the 1981 murder trial, in the face of damaging taped evidence on two less sensational fixes in 1989.

Thomas Breen, one of Roti's lawyers, argued that the jury must rely on the uncorroborated word of Robert Cooley, the corrupt lawyer-turned-wired government operative, to convict Roti of the murder fix. And Breen contended Cooley "is still a scammer who has escaped his many sins."

But Assistant U.S. Atty. Michael Shepard maintained that Roti's trust of Cooley-accepting a payoff in his City Hall office even after he correctly suspected their restaurant hangout was bugged-showed their long corrupt ties.

The two also dealt with each other with ease in the 1989 taped fixes and spoke in a corrupt code both understood, Shepard said.

In comments to the jury, Breen admitted that Roti "bit" on a 1989 zoning change, an apparent concession the alderman fixed the routine matter for money.

But Cooley personally paid Roti $10,000 to help fix the civil case that had been secretly filed by the FBI, the government charged. The final payoff occurred in Roti's City Hall office, prosecutors said.

"The disgrace of it!" Durkin, first assistant U.S. attorney, told jurors in a rising voice. "It's almost incomprehensible."

Prosecutors contended Cooley's secretly recorded tape of Wilson Moy, a businessman sometimes described as Chinatown's unofficial mayor, confirmed Roti's involvement in the fix of the Chinatown murder trial several years earlier.

Prosecutors contend Cooley handed over $72,500 to Roti and Marcy and pocketed $25,000 for his own work in the fix.

In a November 1987 taped meeting with Cooley, Moy claimed Roti hit him up for another $500 in 1981. Moy recounted how he grew up with Roti and went to school with him but then said in a passage quoted twice by prosecutors on Tuesday:

"I found out that, with him money first. Money first. Money first."

Breen argued both 1987 tape with Moy and a 1986 meeting in which Cooley brought up the Chinatown fix with Marcy failed to implicate Roti in the murder trial fix.

Breen blasted Cooley's credibility, calling him "sly and treacherous" as well as "dishonest, conniving and a manipulator" who had not done a decent thing in his life.

In an emotional conclusion to the trial, Roti's son, Bruno, became enraged when Shepard warned the jury that the mention of the recent death of Roti's wife in testimony Monday was intended to curry sympathy.

"That's a shame!" the younger Roti shouted, but his father, sitting a few feet away, quickly calmed him down with a wave of his hand and a stern look.

Later, Fred Roti told a reporter outside the courtroom the prosecutor's comment "was a low blow. That had no bearing on the case," he said.

If jurors believe Roti, 72, helped fix the 1981 murder trial and convict him of racketeering, he faces a much stiffer prison sentence than if he is found guilty of only bribery and extortion.

The federal trial started last month with Marcy, 79, also a defendant, but he suffered a mild heart attack and was unable to continue.